


Vessel

by Luciferious



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-20
Updated: 2012-08-20
Packaged: 2017-11-25 23:13:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/643981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luciferious/pseuds/Luciferious





	Vessel

They haven't seen Castiel in weeks. Three, to be precise— since Carthage, since Hellhounds and makeshift bombs. Since Ellen and Jo and a last-ditch effort proved fruitless. It wasn't unlike Cas to disappear for days, and yes, even weeks at a time, but it was unlike him not to answer a prayer. Or, for that matter, his cell phone.

To make matters worse, Dean had bolted upright from a dream two nights ago, panting and dazed and gun in hand. He'd seen Cas, which wasn't an unusual occurrence, but this had been  _different_. The message had been fractured, broken by light and the scream of a hundred thousand voices. Dean had said it felt like falling through a lightning storm, and the only thing he knew with any amount of certainty was that something was very, _very_ wrong. That something had happened to Cas.

Two days and no answer. Not to Dean's prayers, to Sam's calls. It's as if he has simply faded into the ether entirely. Sam falls asleep eyeing his phone on the nightstand and wondering what happens to angels when they die.

The next time he opens his eyes, Sam knows he's dreaming. It's a particular itch of cheap bedsheets and the saccharine smell of roses laced with bitter smoke, the way the harsh light of roiling flame undulates and shifts above him. Sam rolls to his back and stares up at a ceiling set alight, too slow and calm to be real, smoke pouring like liquid down the walls. The last thing Sam expects when he sits up is a figure looming in the doorway.

" _Sam_ ," a familiar voice pleads. Sam sputters and clambers to his feet, squinting at the shadowed form before him.

"Cas?" Sam is caught somewhere between relief and the unsettling realization that this is a little too much like other dreams he has had—other dreams of other angels. He feels inexplicably cold. "Where the hell are you, man? Are you okay? We've been trying to get ahold of you for days."

"I know." Cas steps into the room, but even the glow from the ceiling fire doesn't quite light his face. Wherever Cas is, it's either very far away, or things are worse than either Sam or Dean feared. "I'm sorry, Sam. I've been unable to contact either of you again until now. I was afraid if I made an attempt to, I would be discovered."

" _Discovered?_ " Sam rounds the end of the bed, but it's as if the closer he gets to Cas, the harder it is to see him. He hesitates there, hands fidgeting at his sides. "Cas, what—"

"I'm being held," he says, tone fading from the rasp Sam knows into a susurrus of quiet voices. The room shakes around them, but neither move with it. "I don't know where, I don't know by whom. This is magick I have never encountered before; it's taking me all my strength just to reach you."

A vase falls from a bookshelf against the wall and shatters on the floor. Sam tries to imagine the sort of spell that could trap an angel so completely, in a way not even holy fire could. He thinks back to Carthage once more and all the people who died there to raise the Horseman Death, decides that whatever it is, it must have come at a very high price. 

"Is there... I mean is there any way at all we can...."

"There is only one way I can think of." Castiel is little more than an apparition, a shadow in the smoke that Sam can only track when he moves. Sam knows without being told that they are running out of time. That when Cas fades, it might be for good.

"I need you to say _yes_."

Sam's blood runs frozen in his veins.

Of course, it all makes sense now. Sam doesn't know how he could be so stupid. Who else but _Lucifer_ would want Cas out of the way? Who else but _Lucifer_ would have the power to conjure such an elaborate trap? Betrayal sinks deep in Sam's heart and he finds himself uncertain for the first time that this is even Castiel before him at all.

" _What?_ "

"Not to Lucifer." Castiel's voice returns as Sam knows it, gruff and heavy with conviction. Sam's confusion is surely written all over his face, but he has little chance to do more than part his lips. "To me."

The bookshelf falls, but Sam hardly notices. He feels so utterly lost, so beyond his depth he can't articulate the sensation. It's a dark pit of dread in his gut and complete _awe_ in the same breath, and it's all Sam can manage to sputter out a weak, " _I don't_...."

"I was pulled from my vessel," Cas explains plainly, but with an edge of desperation that Sam takes note of even in this dazed state. "I don't know where he is, and with Heaven closed to me, I can't locate him on Earth without taking another. I am sorry, Sam, it's too much to ask of you, but I don't have much choice. I'm running out of time."

It _is_ too much to ask. A part of Sam wishes it wasn't—what's little that's left of the believer, of the man who once thought enough good deeds, enough people saved could wipe the blood clean. There was a time when the chance to prove himself and set things right would have been nothing less than providence, but Sam has been down that road. He knows where it ends, and it's that along with lingering nightmares of cities burning at his hands that stops him dead. 

" _Why me?_ " Sam pointedly ignores how much of his life has been spent asking that very same question, narrows his eyes to catch Castiel's shifting form moving toward the window. There had been a streetlamp outside that cost Sam many a full night's sleep; here, beyond the window is nothingness. "Why not... why not Dean?"

It's as much genuine curiosity as it is a blunt statement about the nature of their friendship. Sam holds no ill-will toward Castiel—he will always and forever be the angel that brought his brother back to him, and he has proven himself time and again to be a loyal ally. But Sam has no delusions—to Castiel, he is little more than the demon-blooded boy who set the Devil free. An animal to be cleaned up after, not a friend. 

Castiel turns from the window, and the room shakes more violently than before.

"Vessels run through bloodlines. You and your brother are the result of the convergence of two of the most powerful, traced all the way back to Cain and Abel. It's true; I could take Dean." He pauses then, and if it is possible for a shadow to look thoughtful, even pensive, Castiel seems so in that moment.

"But your blood is more closely tied to my vessel line. Your blood is more compatible. You are the best chance I have, Sam."

A beat, then, " _Please_."

Sam has never heard Castiel say _please_ to anyone. It makes him sound vulnerable in a way Sam has a difficult time reconciling with the fierce Soldier of Heaven he knows, and imagines is equally difficult for Cas to allow.

For the first time, the fire above them seems to rage; a beam falls from the ceiling and slams into the bed frame, catching the bloody sheets alight.

Sam looks at Cas, what little is left of him, and he knows there is only one answer.

"Yes."


End file.
